#tremblay is unfortunately straight

[ijustwantedtoresetmypassword]

I need y'all conclave shippers and writers of fabulous stories to know: kissing would make these men so. much. worse

these idiots built their whole identity on not-kissing. if you make them kiss they *will* implode

[themattress]

Disney’s The Little Mermaid (2023)

All right, I’ve seen it, so let��s do this.

PROS:

- I have some problems with Ariel in this movie, but Halle Bailey ain’t one of ‘em. I mean, good lord. Not only is her singing as beautiful as expected, but her vocal impression of Jodi Benson from the original movie is phenomenal. If you hadn’t seen either movie and just heard audio files of the two back to back, it would be exceedingly difficult to pick out which was which, that’s how spot-on Bailey is with her performance. And even when Ariel is mute, Bailey never fails with her facial expressions, which continue to convey her lovable personality. You totally believe her to be Ariel because she totally believes herself to be Ariel; the sincerity that she exudes is proof of just how committed to doing this iconic character justice she was.

- Luca Paguro himself, Jacob Tremblay, was perfect castling for the voice of Flounder. 

- While I hate everything else about him, I love King Triton’s design and general vibe. He’s less of a traditional king and more of a Poseidon-like god, and that’s a cool take on him.

- The shark attack sequence. I especially liked the new way that Ariel outsmarts the shark. 

- "Part of Your World", both how the scene is staged and, of course, Halle Bailey’s singing. 

- "For the First Time". Again, it’s a Halle Bailey song. You can’t go wrong there.

- Noma Dumezweni as Queen Selina, Eric’s adoptive mother. As pointless as this character was from a story standpoint, I thought that Dumezweni sold it with her performance. 

- Art Malik as Grimsby. I totally bought his fatherly concern and affection for Eric.

- Once they’re finally allowed to start bonding after needlessly putting it off to pad out the runtime some more, Ariel and Eric’s chemistry is on point, especially in the dancing scene.

- Jodi Benson’s cameo as a merchant who gives Ariel a fork. Unexpected and delightful. 

- From the second half of “Poor Unfortunate Souls” and all through the second half of the movie, Melissa McCarthy is suddenly good as Ursula. She’s no Pat Carroll, of course, but she finally has the bombast and intimidation factor down which she was lacking in before.

- Jessica Alexander as Vanessa, who owned those two-or-so minutes she was on screen.

- Before the way it ended I was enjoying the climax. King Triton being straight-up killed rather than turned into a polyp was a genuine shock, and gigantic Ursula was utterly terrifying.

CONS:

- The opening scene is awful. Rather than that epic shot of Eric’s ship coming out of the fog with the music blaring, we get what looks to be a mermaid (actually a dolphin) swimming underwater as whimsical music plays, only for it to get cut off like a joke as the sailors on Eric’s ship try to harpoon the “mermaid” while yelling hateful superstition. Just a terrible start.

- Rather than Triton’s hatred of humans being pure bigotry on his part, the movie decides to "both sides" the conflict, making humans equally as hateful and fearful of merpeople as merpeople are of them. Worse still, they each have valid reasons for this hate and fear, making the end resolution of it being brushed off as a big misunderstanding ring hollow.

- Jonah Hauer-King as Eric. I’m sorry, I just couldn’t take him seriously in the role.

- Worse still, Eric's whole character is fucked up on multiple fronts. First off, he’s now adopted royalty instead of genuine royalty, which gives off the unfortunate implication that this is the real reason he bonds so well with the common folk and desires a life of adventure. Secondly, his life situation is made the same as Ariel’s instead of different, pushing them as kindred spirits too literally and losing much of what made him desirable to Ariel in the original. And finally, his romance with Ariel starts and ends on a lackluster note, with him being too quick to dismiss having anything to do with her after he learns she’s mute and then too quick to accept being together with her was a fantasy never meant to happen after he learns she’s a mermaid. In trying to give him more depth, the filmmakers just made him more confusing.

- The undersea world lacks appeal. You know it, I know it, everyone knows it and have since the trailers came out. More proof that animation is an art form that has things live-action can never replicate, and that Disney needs to stop making these live-action remakes already.

- Javier Bardem as King Triton. He is absolutely terrible in this, giving one of the most dull and disinterested performances I’ve seen in recent memory. He sells none of his lines.

- Triton's character isn’t any better than his actor’s performance. Beyond his bigotry against humans having more justification to it, he is downright cruel and unrelatable in his treatment of Ariel. When Triton crossed the line into abusive parenting in the original by destroying Ariel’s collection, we immediately see a flicker of realization, horror and remorse on his face once he snaps out of his rage. He’s too proud to admit to anything yet, but it helps sell his “What have I done?” remorse that we see later, and his sacrifice for Ariel’s sake in the climax. But here, he seems to have no such remorse. He’s hardly a father; just a tyrant.

- Flounder looks unappealing and Jacob Tremblay’s voice can’t save that. Sebastian looks even more unappealing, and Daveed Diggs’ obnoxiously high-pitched voice only makes his character worse. Scuttle looks unappealing, and Awkwafina creates such a different character with her performance that I don’t get why they bothered even keeping the “Scuttle” name. Much like with The Lion King remake, it again shows animation’s superiority in this regard.

- Ariel's hair is boring regular red and not vivid real red. That’s a fail on such an absurdly fundamental level, as well as a disservice to Halle Bailey who could have rocked such hair.

- Ariel's character, in the script, is as sanitized as I feared. She’s more of a socially conscious fighter for equality rather than a teenager realistically out primarily for herself and her own ambitions, her sexual lust for Eric is toned down to near non-existence, she’s much less of a rebel since she only goes to the surface for the first time when going to see Eric’s ship, she’s made to have far more hesitation in her deal with Ursula to the point she almost backs out entirely until Ursula cranks up her pressure campaign, and as I will talk more about later gets some needless “girlboss” additions the same way previous Disney heroines in live-action remakes have. Thank God for Halle Bailey, who minimizes the damage as best as she can.

- In the first half of the movie all the way through to the first half of “Poor Unfortunate Souls”, Melissa McCarthy is way too understated as Ursula. She’s doing a campy Bette Midler or Eartha Kitt style of voice, but doesn’t go big enough on her lines and absolutely lacks the skin-crawling, psychotic menace that Pat Carroll so effortlessly provided the character with.

- Restoring the deleted concept of Ursula being Triton’s sister and Ariel’s aunt was pointless. 

- "Under the Sea". Beyond the issues of the underwater world on display not working as well as in animation and Daveed Diggs’ ear poison of a voice and delivery not holding even a candlewick to Samuel E Wright, Ariel joins in on the song by the end! Excuse me? The whole point of the song is to convince her to give up her interest in the human world! Her singing along (without being forced to because it’s part of a stage musical rehearsal that she’s obligated to partake in, as is the case in Kingdom Hearts II) is akin to signing off on that! 

- There’s a plot hole about Eric’s kingdom. Apparently it’s incredibly paranoid and isolationist, and part of why Eric wants to explore other places and make connections with them is so that the kingdom “doesn’t get left behind”. That doesn’t stop its village and marketplace from being a bustling hub of multicultural diversity! Which is it? Is the kingdom isolationist or not?

- Related to the above: Eric’s song, “Wild Uncharted Waters”. Yawn.

- Also, Ariel's sisters are all different ethnicities. I assumed this meant that King Triton slept around, which certainly wouldn’t be out of place for a Greek god like he’s styled after. But no, the sisters still speak of “Mother” as if they all have the same mother! How does that work?

- Flotsam and Jetsam don't talk. Boo! Let them talk!

- There is an absolutely pointless change where Ursula, apparently having no real confidence in herself, cheats in her deal with Ariel by slipping in an amnesia potion so that Ariel forgets she needs to kiss Eric in three days’ time to stay human forever. OK, but why does that prevent her from retaining the memory of Sebastian later straight-up telling her she needs to kiss Eric? And why is she still that heartbroken when Eric gets engaged to Vanessa, given that she no longer thinks it means she won’t get to kiss him and thus won’t remain human? 

- Instead of the newly human Ariel making it to shore and getting dressed in a sail before Max sniffs her out and leads Eric to her, she gets caught in a fisher boat’s net, the fisherman gives her a cloak to wear, and he...brings her to the castle? Why? When you fish out a mute girl adrift at sea, why does your mind jump to the freaking castle and its prince as the go-to solution for getting her help? And like I said before, it actually takes away from Eric and Ariel’s bond, since him finding her and, despite his disappointment that she can’t be the girl who saved him since she’s mute, still taking care of her personally since that’s the decent thing to do was a great showing of Eric being a nice guy whom you could understand Ariel loving.

- Actually, the usage of Max is disappointing in general. Eric saves him on the burning ship so that important plot point is checked off, but him having earlier met Ariel and memorized her scent ends up having no pay-off since he isn’t the one to lead Eric to Ariel. On top of this, he doesn’t get to be the one who causes Vanessa’s shell to break and Ariel to get her voice back later, so that’s another important plot function he’s deprived of. And he’s not even a sheepdog anymore, he’s a bearded collie. What was stopping the filmmakers from using a sheepdog!?

- The stupid little jade mermaid sculpture that Eric calls “my Little Mermaid". OK, so is the movie’s title supposed to be in reference to that now? Why include that as a thing at all?

- "Kiss The Girl", beyond being ruined by Daveed Diggs’ voice, has the pointless lyrical change to make sure Eric has Ariel’s consent before kissing her. As the new lyrics say: “Use your words to ask her”. Except...Eric doesn’t fucking do that! He leans in to kiss Ariel, with her also leaning in to kiss him, at the end just like in the original, without him having asked her beforehand if it’s OK! So a classic, perfectly good love song got altered for nothing!

- "The Scuttlebutt". The only good part about it was Ariel hating it as much as I did! 

- Instead of the animals all divebombing Vanessa at her and Eric’s wedding, with Max dealing the finishing blow that makes her lose the shell containing Ariel’s voice, we have Ariel being a girlboss and....engaging Vanessa in a cat fight over the shell, ending with Ariel grabbing it and breaking it herself. Because a cat fight between women is so much more progressive?

- The climax ends with Ariel and Eric swapping places, and Ariel killing Ursula with the ruined ship. This doesn’t work, since not only does Ariel not know how to steer a ship and she looks kind of ridiculous sliding around the deck on her fish tail, Ursula going after Eric specifically rather than Ariel makes no sense (Ariel just killed Flotsam and Jetsam, Ursula is pissed off at her above all else) and Eric not killing Ursula means Triton has no impetus for learning that he was wrong about humans. Maybe this wouldn’t be a problem if Triton stayed dead in this version (since, y’know, he actually died), but alas he gets resurrected once Ursula is killed and loses the trident. And sure enough, he’s learned nothing, which leads us directly into...

- The Ending. Ariel just accepts living under the sea from now on and becomes severely depressed about it, which somehow makes Triton change his mind and turn her human (she was depressed after he destroyed her grotto and he clearly didn’t give a fuck; what’s the difference now?) Eric had also accepted he and Ariel weren’t meant to be after all, but once she shows up as a human again he instantly reverse on that. Queen Selina sadly remarked that the human world and mer-world just weren’t meant to exist together...but then Ariel is made human again and gets together with Eric, and then she says the exact opposite and endorses the two worlds existing together! Everyone is just changing their mind at the drop of a hat; it’s ridiculous! And rather than ending on a wedding with a beautiful choir version of “Part of Your World” being sung, the movie abruptly ends with Eric and Ariel sailing off in a boat toward a ship that they will use to explore other kingdoms and further connect the two worlds together in the process while the generic instrumental “Part of Your World” plays. There’s just....no real heart to it. Which sums up this movie’s problem: like the vast majority of these live-action remakes, it was not made with the same heart as the animated original. The best that can be said about it is that it’s not the worst of the remakes, and that it provides a great stepping stone for Halle Bailey’s professional acting career. Beyond that, it’s useless.

[if-you-fan-a-fire]

"GIVE THE CRIMINAL "A FIGHTING CHANCE"," Toronto Star. July 13, 1918. Page 11. ---- Founder of Honor League of Canada Vividly Describes Workings of Organization. ---- THOMAS O. WOODS founder and general secretary of the Honor League of Canada whose motto is to give the criminal "a fighting chance." --- "We ask a fighting chance." That is the vibrant appeal of the Honor League of Canada. founded by Thos. O. Woods, a man who served 3 1/4 years In Auburn Penitentiary for robbery, and who, after succeeding in "hitting the straight road" himself is now bending all his energies to help unfortunates who are not strong us he and who, he is convinced. will follow the narrow path once they are put on it with sound foundation.

"I have hundreds of times seen men who had paid for their crimes walk out of prison, only to be shunned and shoved dwn deeper by their fellow-men," Mr Woods told The Star today.

The Terrible Stigma. A man who has done a wrong, and sometimes he is unjustly accused, comesinto the free air again with the feeling of the stigma of crime burned into his soul. He wavers at the glance of his brothers on the street, even though he he fired with the determination to go straight. This feeling is accentuated by the frigid reception he receives, and everywhere he applies for work there are the inevitable questions to be answered, "Where did you work last?" "Where are your recommendations?" Without them, he is shown the door, with the result that he grows despondent, and with crime the only alternative to earn his bread and butter, he is forced back to his old haunts."

Thus the Honor League has been founded, by a man strong and capable enough to surmount the obstacles in his way. Now the organization has the backing of hundreds of the big men of Canada, who have investigated and seen the fruitful results of Mr. Woods' labors. Some of the men who have given testimonials and signified their intention of lending the utmost support are Sir Percy Sherwood, Bishop Sweeney of Toronto, Bishop Farthing, J. Tremblay, Director of Public Safety, W. P. Archibald, Dominion Parole Officer, and countless others.

A Remarkable Fight. The story of the man who is at the head of this movement reads like a novel. Born in the vicinity of Toronto, and having lived here for a number of years, Mr. Woods went to the States while still a boy. He settled in Syracuse, and after a somewhat checkered existence, he was finally convicted of robbery in the third degree. He was sentenced to three years and three months in Auburn Peaitentiary. Four years to the very hour after his release Mr. Woods spoke in Westminster and First Presbyterian Churches to capacity audiences in the town where he was formerly hounded from day to day by the police, and where finally he paid. for his culminating crime

"It was a strange feeling." declared Mr. Woods. "The last time I left Syracuse I was the butt of every policeman and ordered to get out of town. Coming back this time I was hailed as a friend, not only by those poor unfortunates in jail, but by the police and every influential person in Syracuse."

Works Out Salvation. Mr. Woods, in relating his own later experiences, said: "I arrived in Montreal May 28th, 1913, after serving a sentence in a State prison in New York. I had with me my mother and three-year-old son and exactly ten cents in my pocket to start life over with, but fully determined to carry out the plans I had laid down in prison - plans which would work out my own salvation -and then, again, I had promised my Redeemer I would after my release, devote the rest of my life to the cause of the ex-convict. I decided to carry out these plans in my home town, where everybody knew me, for, somehow, the most despised person in the world is the ex-convict, I hope that this will not always be so.

The Inevitable Question. "After 10 days of more planning and thinking. I started out to find work, dressed in an ex-convict's outfit, rough shoes and prison made clothes, and the only recommendation in my pocket was a letter from the principal keeper of the prison had just left as regards my ability to work hard. My belt was drawn tight, for I was hungry. Can you imagine a man in that conditions asking an employer for work, while outside looking through the window was a detective who had recognized the prison-made clothes, and was trailing me to see what he could get on me. Every man who leaves prison without friends or money has to go through that.. Place yourself in that man's place when the employer asks, "Where did you work last" or let me see your recommendations."

"After weeks of searching I secured a position with a transfer company at $1.29 a day, of 14 hours, and seven. days a week, handling baggage. I stayed at this work just two weeks. Unable to stand the work any longer through lack of nourishment, the best I could do was to get odd Jobs here and there. After several ups and downs yet with my purpose as fixed as ever, in March, 1915, I pald a visit to Bordeaux Jail, accompanied by one of the chaplains, and informed the inmates that there would be a place for them to come. after release, if they meant to live an honest life, and in May following I opened a "home" at 115 Milton street. We hope to have these homes all over Canada."

How Criminals Are Aided. A. M. Nicol, prison Inspector for the Volunteer Prison League, and former editor of the Montreal Weekly Star, in a letter recently received, recalls the time when Woods was leaving Auburn prison determined to make good and consecrating himself to aid his less staunch fellowmen.

The League Itself was founded by Mr. Woods on July 5, 1915, and incorporated Dec. 5, 1917. It was reorganized on June 10, 1917, and placed on its present successful basis. Within the last year the League has disbursed, 11,518 meals, 4,085 lodgings and given away 1,000 garments.

The sum of $2.869.90 was expended on the men within the year, and the men, though being placed on, their honor have returned $1,805.25. The record speaks for itself. The men are taken from prison or from the street after they have been discharged from prison, and the honor system applied, which means "to give the man a real fighting chance in a man's way, and not a stingy appllcation of cold charity."

700 Men Cared For. Since the founding of the League, over 700 men have passed through." Only eight per cent. have gone back to prison, and it is believed that after next May, when the Province of Quebec goes dry, that a still better showing will be made. Of the above number, 51 have enlisted, 46 of these before conscription was put into force. Mr. Woods has received many letters from these "silent heroes." who though they win honors on the battlefield are not given full credit because of the fact that their past stands in the way of publicity.

Mr. Woods clted an instance of the workings of the League right here in Toronto. Yesterday he visited a little store in the west end of the city and informed a young wife that her husband who had been liberated from a Quebec prison, had applied to the League for assistance. He was given food and clothing, and placed at munitions work at Trenton. When he learned Mr. Woods was coming to Toronto he asked him to tell his wife that he had gone to work and would not come home until he had "made good."

Purposes of the League. Summed up briefly the purposes of the League are: 1. The reformation of the criminal; 2. Protection for those unjustly accused; 3. Probation for first offenders, employment, and when necessary. food and shelter for discharged prisoners; 4, necessary aid for prisoner's families: 5, supervision for those on probation and parole. and lastly, prison reform.

"It is a large bill, but we are going to fill it," said Mr. Woods. "I have been asked several times to try and interest the people of Toronto, by citizens who could not carry the whole burden of the organization. The work has so far been handled from most every important prison centre. The work has so been handled from Montreal, but we are anxious to establish the league in every town or city where we can get sufficient people interested to carry it on.

"A Fighting Chance." "Any person who is desirous of contributing to the work, or who wishes more information, or again, persons who would organize a general meeting of some kind to further this great work could have prompt attention by applying to me, care of the Honor League of Canada Inc., 251 St. Antoine Street, Montreal.

"Our object is to give the ex-convict a "fighting chance, because the majority of these men will become producers instead of consumers, if given that chance," says Mr. Woods. "Besides, to save a man for useful work in this great crisis is a real war work."

[pretendicanwrite]

Hello!! I've been thinking about o'knutzy alot recently and personally I have not be doing entirely well, so if you wanted to project on my behalf something where one of the boys is having a hard time? Some hurt/comfort (or hurt/no comfort if you feel so inclined) thank you! I love your writing anyways and reread stuff all the time :))

Hi! I hope this works for your request! Please enjoy!

CW: Panic/Anxiety attack, Mental health discussion, argument

**********

“Damnit, O’Hara! You’re supposed to move the damn puck! Run it again!” Coach Weasley yelled, shaking his clipboard to the point where Finn was afraid he was going to throw it at him. “Everyone else is doing their part. Your job is to get the puck to Black. You are failing at your only job! You are an NHL player! Play like one. Get it there!”

Finn merely nodded, his breath coming in rapid pants, and red in the face. They started the play from the beginning, running it again, and Finn failed again.

“O’Hara! You’re out! Tremblay get in here!”

Finn skated off the ice, and bypassed the bench, heading straight for the hallway as he took off his helmet. He was stripping his pads as he went, and he barely made it around the corner before he fell to his knees gripping at his throat. He still hadn’t caught his breath.

It’s not your fault. It’s an off day.

No matter what he told himself, it wasn’t helping his breathing. He was spiraling. His thoughts were becoming more incoherent by the second.

You just couldn’t do it. It’s simple, and you couldn’t even manage it. Failure. You failed at the only thing you know how to do.

Finn shifted from his knees to his butt and leaned against the wall behind him. His knees were pulled up to his chest, and his arms were wrapped around them. He rested his head on his knees, still breathing quickly, but shallowly, and he felt like he wasn’t getting any oxygen.

“Shit! Finn?”

Finn’s head raised to look at who shouted for him, barely breathing at this point. He saw Remus running down the hall towards him, coming from the direction of the ice.

“Hey, Harzy.” Remus kneeled down in front of him, looking him over for any clues as to what was going on. “I need you to try and calm down your breathing for me. You’re going to black out if you don’t.”

Finn was trying to. Honestly, he was. He tried everything he thought would work. Remus tried to breathe with him, exaggerating his breath’s so Finn could match them, but none of it was working.

“I’m going to go get Knutty and Tremz. I need you to keep trying to breath.”

“Don’t! Do-don’t leave me. I… I. Don’t!”

“Okay. Alright. I’m staying right here, but Finn we have to do something bud. You’re breathing isn’t getting any better, and I need you to breathe.”

Finn reached out and splayed his hand across Remus’ chest. He focused on Remus’ heartbeat and tried to match his to it, and it worked a little, but he went right back to panicking as soon as he noticed the team, including the coach turned the corner.

“Hey, Harzy. Are you all right?” Cap asked, glancing over at Remus.

Logan shouldered his way towards Finn from the back of the small group and offered his arms for Finn to fall into. “Hey, baby. We know what to do. We’re going to breathe together, and I want you to focus on the feeling of my ribs expanding. Try to match it.”

Finally, something seemed to slow his breathing to a point where he was actually able to form words, and coherent thoughts. He was no longer on the verge of blacking out, and he was calming down by the second in Logan’s arms.

This wasn’t the first anxiety or panic attack he had in front of Logan, and unfortunately, it probably wouldn’t be the last. They had made a system in college for episodes like this. Logan would hug Finn loose enough for Finn to be able to breathe, and he would over-exaggerate his breathing to the point where his chest was expanding inches for Finn to be able to feel it.

“That’s it. You’ve got this.” Logan rubbed smooth circles on Finn’s back and whispered encouragements into his ear as he held him. “You’re doing so good baby. You’re doing great.”

When he finally felt like he could breathe on his own, he pulled out of Logan’s arms and faced the rest of the group.

Leo looked terrified, Remus seemed relieved to finally see Finn breathing, Logan looked as calm as one could be when they saw a loved one panicking, and Coach and Sirius both looked guilty.

“I failed. I couldn’t get the play right. I’m sorry coach. I was trying though! I promise!”

Coach just chuckled and shook his head. “I don’t even care about that Finn. Hockey means nothing if I don’t have players that are able to play. My team's health, physical and mental, is far more important than running a play for the first few times. If you ever feel like this again during a practice or a game, you can just come to talk to me, and we can work something out. I promise.”

“The same goes for me as well. Every single player on this team matters to me. I don’t ever want anyone to feel like they have to put their health at risk just to get a play down, or win a game.”

Finn just nodded and leaned against the wall. Technically, they were supposed to have a team stretching session after practice, but Finn was pretty sure he could get permission to go home and take a nap instead. He was exhausted from the prior events and didn’t have the energy to face the team.

“They should all be in the shower by now if you want to head into the locker room,” Leo offered, his eyes looking a bit glassy.

Finn didn’t even bother to respond, just started the rest of the way down the hallway. Leo was right, the locker room was almost deserted, and the sound of rowdy hockey players could be heard from the showers.

Leo and Logan gathered his gear off the ground in the hallway and carried it for him to the locker room. Finn immediately stripped, and changed into the street clothes that he wore this morning. He didn’t even bother to shower, not ready to exert that much energy.

“Coach,” Leo started, turning to face the man, “I think it would be best if we took Finn home. He’s in no condition to drive, and I’m sorry, but I’m not comfortable leaving him home alone right now.”

“Absolutely. If you ever need to talk boys, I’ll always be here. And Finn, I’m sorry I was so hard on you this morning. The play didn’t work with Logan either, so it was just the play. It wasn’t you that caused it to fail. It was a long shot, and I took the fact that I made a mistake in the planning, out on you. It wasn’t fair to you, and I’m sorry that I let it happen.”

“It’s a fine coach. It was an off day to start with, so the play was just something that caused it to tip over. It wasn’t the only factor in the equation. Thank you for letting me go. Have a nice rest of your day.”

Leo grabbed both his and Finn’s bag and followed after his boys as they walked to the player parking lot.

“So, how uh- how many of these attacks have you had?”

“They were pretty common for him in college. I can’t speak for the time before or in between, but he hasn’t had one that I’ve known about in months. Before we started dating was probably one of the last ones.”

“Did either of you think that maybe it might have been important to clue me in on these things? I was helpless there while you could barely breathe, Finn. It was terrifying to stand there having no clue what to do for the man that I love.”

Finn stayed quiet, only letting one tear fall before quickly wiping it away with the sleeve of his hoodie.

“I’m sorry Leo. I honestly was the only one who knew what to do for such a long time that I kind of forgot that there was someone else that Finn would feel comfortable enough to disclose this kind of thing with.”

“I’m not,” Finn whispered, dropping his head to avoid Leo’s eyes in the rearview mirror.

“Not what?”

“I’m not, well wasn’t, comfortable enough to share this with you.” Finn glanced up quick enough to see Leo’s face fall, but he quickly steeled it back into a neutral expression and focused back on the road.

“Oh. That’s fine.”

“Leo, I’m sure that’s not what he meant. Finn loves you and he trusts you, but this was a big thing that we kept just between the two of us for the longest time, and it’s hard to bring anyone else into it.”

Leo didn’t bother responding, but he glanced back at Finn again, with something that could only be described as heartbreak in his eyes.

“It’s not that I don’t trust you. I do, I promise babe, but I didn’t want to get you involved in something that I’m ashamed and afraid of. You have enough to worry about, and I was embarrassed by how needy I would seem if we had to put together an emergency plan on how to calm me drown from attacks. The reason I didn’t tell you had nothing to do with how much I love and trust you. I was afraid that it would seem like too much too quickly. Then, as our relationship grew stronger, it was just easier not to tell you. I am sorry love. I am.”

“It’s fine. I’m sorry I overreacted.”

The boys drove the rest of the way home in silence, and when they did get to the apartment, Leo went straight to the bathroom and hopped in the shower.

The water was loud enough, that for the first few minutes, it muffled the sounds of Leo’s cries, but as they grew into sobs, Finn and Logan’s hearts broke more with each noise.

“Did I make a terrible mistake Logan? Should I have just told him before we started dating?”

“It was your decision Finn, and yeah, I do think you should have told him earlier, but the past is the past. All we have to do right now is make sure that everyone is okay, and that there’s no misunderstanding that’s going to grow any larger. I think it’s best if you head to the bedroom and take a nap while I wait for Leo and make some sandwiches.”

Finn followed his instructions, and walked down the hallway towards his room, but paused by the bathroom door. He opened it a crack and called out for Leo’s attention. When Leo responded with a watery, ‘yes?’ Finn stripped down completely and joined his giant boyfriend under the water spray.

“I’m sorry I made you feel like this.”

“It’s not even the fact that you didn’t let me know what was going on with you. Nothing was ever as devastating to me, as seeing you standing there, on the brink of passing out because you couldn’t breathe. I didn’t know what to do, or if there was even anything I could do. I want to be able to help you and take care of you, but I couldn’t. I don’t even care that you kept something from me, I care that I didn’t know what to do to help you. I love you, and I’m supposed to be able to take care of you.”

“I know, and I’m sorry.”

They finished under the shower spray and got dressed before heading out to collect their sandwiches from Leo. After all three of them finished, they climbed into bed despite the fact that it was barely even 6 o’clock.

“We love you, no matter what Finn.”

“We love you more than the number of stars in the sky.

**********

[nicos-oc-hell]

Quick disclaimer this is set in the flipped universe so, voldy doesn’t exist

Template made by @unfortunate-arrow sorry I forgot to tag you when I made the post

IDENTITY

Full Name: Viktor Ayas Perphyra

Nicknames: Vik (by most of his friends) Wolfie (his mother) Elfo (His father)

Date of Birth: 12 September 1934

Gender: cis male

Sexuality: straight

Blood Status: half-blood

Ethnicity/Race: halfling and mixed

Nationality: Egyptian

MBTI Type: Protagonist, ENFJ-A

Residence: He lived in Egypt with his grandparents, on his mom’s side, at their home before he moved to Scottland when he turned 11 with his parents into the house that his grandfather had bought ona nice piece of land.

MAGIC 

Wand:

Wood: Holly Wood

Core: Phoenix feather

Length: 14 ½’

Flexibility: slightly springy

Other Magical Abilities: Elven magic that is passed down and he is a werewolf

Patronus: Rottwiler

Patronus Memory: Meeting his first friends

Boggart: TBD

Riddikulus: TBD

Amortentia: TBD

Mirror of Erised: TBD

HOGWARTS 

House: Slytherin

OWL Classes:

Transfiguration - A

Charms - O

Herbology - O

Astronomy - A

Potions - O

History of Magic - O

Defense Against the Dark Arts - E

Flying - A

OWL Electives:

Study of ancient runes - E

Alchemy - O

Care of magical creatures - O

NEWT Classes:

Charms - E

Care of Magical Creatures - O

Herbology - O

Alchemy - O

Defense against the dark arts - E

Quidditch: beater

Prefect: 4th-6th year

Clubs: Alchemy club and Herbology club

Favorite Professors: tbd

Least Favorite Professors: tbd

CAREER

11-18 - Hogwarts

22-67 - Teacher

APPEARANCE

Faceclaim: Jacob Tremblay (4-14) Wentworth Miller (16-67)

Height: 5’8

Weight: 164 lbs

Hair Color: Brown

Hair Style: short and curly

Eye Color: light blue 

Skin Tone: Warm Ivory

Scars: a scar on the back of his neck from his first magical accident

Modifications: (piercings, tattoos, glasses, etc.) he needs glasses for long distance and he’s got a couple tattoos scattered across his body

Distinguishing Marks: the pointy ears

Clothing Style: it's a pretty simple style that he has going on, jeans, some simple button down shirts (he leaves them with only like 2-3 buttons done), plain shirts, sweaters, Henleys and a jacket

Accessories: (watch, jewelry, etc.)

What’s In Their Pockets?:

Wand

Money

Candy

Coins

What’s In Their School Bag?:

Text books

Muggle fantasy books

Muggle snacks he smuggled in

A board game

VOICE & LANGUAGE

Voiceclaim: Wentworth Miller

Accent: (might differ from voiceclaim’s) he picked up a scottish accent

Dialect: Egyptian Arabic when he is speaking Arabic

Language Spoken: Arabic, English and Elvish

Languages Understood: Elvish, English and Arabic

Speech and/or Language Disorder: He mispronounces words a lot if he starts talking very fast

FAMILY

Father: Jason Perphyra

Mother: Yasmine Shadid

Pets: dragon toad 

FRIENDSHIPS

Best Friends: Hester Nott

Canon Friends: Abraxas Malfoy, Tom Riddle, Anton Dolohov and Saxi Rowle

Friends:

Elizabeth Somerset (@camillejeaneshphm)

(let me know if you want your ocs to be friends with him!)

Acquaintances: tbd

It’s Complicated: tbd

Dormmates: Abraxas Malfoy, Anton Dolohov and Saxi Rowle

Rivals: tbd

Enemies: tbd

ROMANCE & CHILDREN

Love Interest: Elizabeth Somerset

Future Children: 

Viktor Perphyra Jr

Pietro Perphyra

Anatoly Perphyra

PERSONALITY

Traits:

Positive: friendly, outgoing, loyal and trustworthy

Neutral: observant, stubborn, impatient

Negative: smart aleck, oblivious at times

Favorites:

Color: violet

Food: shrimp alfredo

Weather: stormy

Books: Alchemy books

Hobbies: learning new magic

Music: tbd

Dislikes: Abraxas and Honey

Description: A cheerful man, Viktor is always looking to help someone whether they want his help or not, he's always there offering it. Being rather book smart Viktor spends a lot of his time in the library learning all sorts of magic, preferably Alchemy or Herbology

MBTI Description: ENFJs have great people skills and are often described as warm, affectionate, and supportive. ENFJs are great at encouraging other people and derive personal satisfaction from helping others. ENFJs are often so interested in devoting their time to others that they can neglect their own needs.

HISTORY & BACKGROUND

Pre-Hogwarts Childhood: 

Living with his grandparents in Egypt

Learning the basics of alchemy with his grandfather

Helping his father with magical creatures

Gardening with his grandmother

Got bit by a werewolf in the forest behind his new home in Scotland

Hogwarts Years: (not in chronological order)

Got sorted into Slytherin

An awkward stage between 14-16 where he went through puberty

Separation anxiety from being away from his grandparents for the first time

Sneaking out of hogwarts with his friends

Joining the quidditch team as a beater in his third year

Becoming a prefect in his 4th year surprisingly

Meets Elizabeth Somerset sometime in the early year of hogwarts

Joining the death eaters in his fifth year with Anton and Saxi

Adulthood: (not in chronological order)

Teaching at hogwarts as an Alchemy teacher

Fucking over Dumbledor’s army of “good wizards”

Getting married to Elizabeth

Raising the disasters known as his sons

Death:

In 2001, it was discovered that Viktor had a brain tumor and he didn’t want it to be cured with a simple flick of a wand so he was surrounded by his family and friends during his last few days on Earth.

[fruitcoops]

If you have time could you do Finnlo taking care of Leo after his Greyback injury you wrote yesterday?

Hell yes I can, thank you for prompting me to do this! I love these three goofballs. Hazel (lumosinlove) specifically requested that creators stop tagging her in their content for a couple days while she catches up, but credit for O’Knutzy/ Sweater Weather/ Coast to Coast belongs to her!

Leo heard them before he saw them.

“We’re looking for Leo Knut, he got hurt in the game—”

“—ride home—”

“—not family, but his folks aren’t here—”

“—want to make sure—”

Logan and Finn’s anxious voices echoed all the way down the hall, interspersed with the exasperation of the medics. “Just be gentle,” Emmeline said as the handle turned. It sounded as if she had already told them several times. “He’s not going to be up for a lot of activity. Knut, is it okay if O’Hara and Tremblay come in?”

I’d like to see you try to keep them away. “Yeah, all good.”

The door swung open and Logan and Finn tumbled in, hurrying straight to his side. “Mon dieu, Peanut, you…” Logan trailed off as he looked over Leo’s bare torso. Leo didn’t blame him—mottled bruises in a wild rainbow of colors stretched from his ribs to his mid-abdomen in a wobbly arc from where he had collided with the goalpost.

“Oh, Knutty,” Finn said softly, taking his hand. “How’re you feeling?”

“Better than I was,” he assured them with a quick squeeze. “It’s not as bad as it looks, I promise.”

“He’ll be fine in about three weeks,” Emmeline said from the doorway. “Bruised ribs and tissue, no breaks.”

“Thank God,” Logan sighed, dropping his forehead onto Finn’s shoulder. “Are you ready to go home?”

“Hell yes, lemme just—” Leo cut off with a barely-stifled groan when he tried to sit up. Stars popped in his vision as pain throbbed all the way down to his elbows. “Right, okay, bad plan. Uh, could I get a hand really quick?”

“You can have four,” Finn said. He scooted both his warm palms beneath Leo’s shoulders while Logan slid his under his lower back and together, they lifted him into a sitting position. “Can you swing your legs over?”

“Yeah, one second.” It took a moment of maneuvering, but Leo managed to stand up and lean into Finn with one arm around Logan’s waist. “Thanks.”

“Do you have a shirt? Not that I don’t like the view, but it’s cold out,” Logan said, running his free hand lightly down Leo’s side.

“All my stuff is still in the locker room.” A sudden thought struck him. “By the way, is Loops alright? I heard he and Greyback got into it.”

Logan and Finn shared an indecipherable look. “Cap took him home about fifteen minutes ago.” Finn shuffled his feet a little. “He…wasn’t doing great last I saw him, but then again, neither were we.”

Emmeline and the other medic had already left the room, so Leo had no qualms about leaning down and kissing both his boys on the lips. “Stop worrying, I promise I’m okay. Cap will know what to do, too, so there’s nothing to worry about tonight except finding me a shirt.”

“As unfortunate as it is, it’s necessary,” Logan sighed as they began slowly walking to the door. “If anything hurts, promise you’ll tell us immediately.”

“I promise.”

They soon agreed that it would be quicker and easier if Logan grabbed their things from the locker room while Finn and Leo made their way out of the building and into the car, since they were moving at the approximate rate of a dying snail in their current situation.

“I’m sorry I’m so slow.” Leo winced as he readjusted his arm to take some pressure off Finn’s neck.

“Hey.” A soft flick to his ear. “None of that. And stop trying to walk by yourself, I know it’s hurting you.” Leo transferred his weight back guiltily and nearly sighed aloud at the relief. “There you go. Come on, Nutter Butter, I’m a big strong hockey player. I can carry my boyfriend to the car just fine.”

“I know you can, but you shouldn’t have to.”

“Let me do this; it makes me feel useful.” He turned to Leo with big doe eyes and his resolve crumbled in an instant.

“That’s a cheap trick, Heartthrob O’Hara,” he muttered, placing a quick kiss to his cheekbone. “You know I’m weak for the eyes.”

Finn smiled devilishly. “Whatever it takes to keep you leaning on me.”

Logan caught up with them before they reached the door, thankfully, lugging three bags of hockey gear and a fresh shirt for Leo. “I couldn’t find a button-down,” he apologized as Leo struggled to hold his arms out.

“I love you so much,” Leo groaned as the soft fabric fell over him. The chilly air had felt good while he was recovering from the initial shock, but he had been freezing for close to half an hour and was not looking forward to going shirtless in the autumn wind. Through miraculous foresight on his own part, their car was parked close to the players’ entrance; within ten minutes, the engine rumbled lowly as Finn pulled out of the parking lot.

Leo’s eyes drifted shut and he leaned against the window while the seat warmers soothed the battered muscles of his back. “Go to sleep, mon amour,” Logan said quietly from the backseat. Leo, who was unable to refuse him anything when he used that voice, was out cold in moments.

[mywindowslookwriting]

A Partial A24 Ranking

A24 is an American production company, known for creating indie megahits like Midsommar, Moonlight, and The Spectacular Now. Unfortunately, I haven’t seen any of those. But irregardless, here is my (partial) A24 ranking, of just the ones I’ve seen.

10. Mid90s (2018) dir. Jonah Hill

The directorial debut from actor Jonah Hill is a ‘slice-of-life’ look at teen skateboarders, with some nice cinematography, 90s nostalgia, but also unfortunately a huge helping of toxic masculinity and lack of consequences. The main characters toss around slurs casually, and they cheer when the thirteen-year-old boy protagonist has his first sexual experience with a much older girl – who was possibly 22-23 at the time of filming. Drug use is romanticized, and the ending finds characters still static and without consequences for their bad choices. Honestly, if you like skateboarding movies, just watch Skate Kitchen.

9. The Bling Ring (2013) dir. Sofia Coppola

The true story of a group of wealthy L.A. teens who robbed various celebrities like Paris Hilton and Lindsay Lohan is turned into a surface-level enjoyable film. I enjoy Sofia Coppola’s work, and the film takes the viewer on a wild ride of privilege and celebrity, but it has a tendency to feel like the viewer is being given the keys themselves, with Coppola not really having anything to say about their actions. It’s not necessarily a bad thing, but it leads to a film that feels a little devoid of meaning.

8. Eighth Grade (2018) dir. Bo Burnham

A surprising directorial debut from a comedian, Eight Grade looks at, well, the last week of eighth grade as a socially awkward girl tries to survive until high school. As a movie, it’s so deeply apt it’s insane, and features some great acting from Elsie Fisher as the protagonist, but the only reason I couldn’t rank it higher is because there was so much second-hand embarrassment – as anyone who used to be a child now thinking about everything they did as a kid understands – that it was hard to watch. That being said, I still definitely recommend it.

7. The Florida Project (2017) dir. Sean Baker

In the shadow of Disneyland, kids living in motels play, go on adventures, and get into trouble while the adults in their lives struggle with money and hard choices. The contrast plunges the viewer back into childhood, but makes the adult issues blindingly clear in a moving snapshot that feels like hot summer on your skin as it moves from slow-moving happiness to fear to frustration to anger, and finally, maybe, hope.

6. Room (2015) dir. Lenny Abrahamson

Based on a book, a woman (Brie Larson) kidnapped and trying to raise her son (Jacob Tremblay) in a single room. It’s emotionally devastating, with superb acting – Brie Larson won an Oscar for her role -, and although it cut a lot and isn’t entirely faithful to the source material, but that’s okay because it’s such a moving and eventually heartwarming drama film.

5. Never Goin’ Back (2018) dir. Augustine Frizzell

In the hot Texan world of Never Goin’ Back, poverty is a given. So why shouldn’t two best friends celebrate one of their birthdays at the beach, even if it means spending their rent money? The movie is funny, many of the girls’ antics are hilarious, and a beautiful celebration of the many forms – and frankly, insanely homoerotic in this case – of female friendship. It has its flaws, putting it lower on the list, but Never Goin’ Back makes it easy to laugh, or to give opportunities to look deeper into its meaning.

4. The Farewell (2019) dir. Lulu Wang How far would you go for family? Would you lie to them about having terminal cancer so they are happy for their last few months? For families in the western world, this question is unfamiliar, something no one would consider doing, but the film’s look at a Chinese family reuniting under the pretense of a wedding in order to spend time with the protagonist’s grandmother for the last time is intensely relatable because it is about family. Whether laughing or crying, the Farewell deftly tackles messy family lives, and all you can learn from others just by listening.

3. 20th Century Women (2016) dir. Mike Mills

In the rapidly-changing landscape of late 70s California, an older single woman is struggling to raise her teenaged son, so she enlists the help of his best friend and a punk artist boarding in their house. The cinematography and structure takes risks, with colour pouring out of highway scenes, and the future lives of characters being revealed, but it’s not artsy and inaccessible. It’s surprising that a male director could have represented different types of women and their struggles, but he did it, and he did it well.  

2. American Honey (2016) dir. Andrea Arnold

Lead actress Sasha Lane was discovered on a beach with her friends during spring break. Her character is invited to travel through America selling magazines with other misfit teens in a grocery store parking lot. The almost three-hour long movie is as sprawling as the sky in the south and midwest of America. It’s a hot summer day that feels refreshing, not stifling. It’s young love and lingering closeup shots. It’s the American dream, updated. American Honey is almost three hours long, freeform and calm, beautiful and frantic. It’s a languid summer day, and the cool glass of water you inhale afterwards. Simply, it is American Honey.

1. Lady Bird (2017) dir. Greta Gerwig

Trying to escape your hometown. Arguing with your parents. Falling in love, or maybe not. Dancing at prom with your best friend. Moments of universal high school feelings add up to a superb directorial debut from writer and actress Greta Gerwig of one seventeen-year-old girl in her last year of high school. Appearing on the surface as a straight-forward coming-of-age film, the focus on the women of the film that rarely finds time to stray to love interest characters makes it feel fresh, especially helped by wonderful acting from Saoirse Ronan and Laurie Metcalf. It’s an alternative glimpse of life packaged into a mainstream tale of relatability that makes it A24’s best film.  

-written by sagan, september 4th 2019

[ao3-feed-musketeers]

All the names I've been given

read it on the AO3 at http://bit.ly/2WwD2TN

by FreyaLor

A birthday gift for a very excellent Richelieu afficionado.

 Palais-Cardinal, 1637. After the victory of Corbie, a nameless courtier appears to threaten the reputation of Captain de Tréville with secret messages he was never meant to find. Unfortunately for this courtier, by coming straight to Richelieu, he made a very bad choice of person.

Words: 10393, Chapters: 2/2, Language: English

Fandoms: The Musketeers (2014), French History RPF

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences

Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply

Categories: M/M

Characters: Armand Jean du Plessis de Richelieu, de Tréville (Trois Mousquetaires), Jussac, François Leclerc du Tremblay | Father Joseph

Relationships: Armand Jean du Plessis de Richelieu & Jussac, Armand Jean du Plessis de Richelieu & Father Joseph, Armand Jean du Plessis de Richelieu/de Tréville (Jean-Armand du Peyrer)

Additional Tags: Assassination, Paranoia, 17th century French politics

read it on the AO3 at http://bit.ly/2WwD2TN

[brokehorrorfan]

Best New Horror Movies on Netflix: Spring 2018

There’s an overwhelming amount of horror movies to sift through on Netflix, so I’ve decided to take out some of the legwork by compiling a list of the season’s best new genre titles available on Netflix’s instant streaming service.

Please feel free to leave a comment with any I may have missed and share your thoughts on any of the films you watch. You can also peruse past installments of Best New Horror Moves on Netflix for more suggestions.

1. The Ritual

The Ritual is the great Blair Witch Project sequel we never got. Although not found footage, it explores many similar plot points as the recent Blair Witch - yet it feels far more fresh and, more importantly, scarier. The first two acts are superbly eerie, and, while it loses a tiny bit of momentum toward the end, it offers a truly imaginative creature design. After memorable segments in several anthologies, David Bruckner's (V/H/S, The Signal) feature directorial debut offers a small but strong cast led by Rafe Spall (Prometheus), well-developed characters, a creative use of flashbacks, and a brilliant atmosphere of dread.

2. Veronica

Veronica's reputation precedes it, as it has been the subject of several high-profile articles touting it as the scariest movie on Netflix. I'm not sure it lives up to that claim, but it's certainly worth seeing for yourself. Based on true events, the film takes place in 1991 Madrid. When 15-year-old Veronica (Sandra Escacena) attempts to contact her deceased father with a Ouija board alongside two fellow Catholic schoolgirls, she becomes haunted by something from the other side. Escacena - an actual teenager - delivers a great performance, and director Paco Plaza ([Rec]) channels James Wan in his expert crafting of frightening set pieces.

3. Before I Wake

Nearly three years after it was supposed to open in theaters, Before I Wake was rescued from rights issues by Netflix. Director Mike Flanagan (Ouija: Origin of Evil, Gerald's Game) has since cemented himself as a modern master of horror, and Before I Wake is another winner. Kate Bosworth (Superman Returns) and Thomas Jane (The Mist) star as a couple who, still grieving the death of their young son, adopt a 6-year-old boy, Cody (a then-unknown Jacob Tremblay, Room). Upon learning that Cody's dreams manifests themselves in reality, the parents encourage him to dream about their deceased son in order to spend more time with him. Unfortunately for everyone, Cody also suffers from nightmares about a creature he calls The Canker Man. It's a bit heavy on exposition, but the film has ample heart and strong visuals. Similar to the work of Guillermo del Toro, Before I Wake blends horror motifs with fantastical and dark dramatic elements.

4. 47 Meters Down

Originally scheduled to go straight-to-DVD in 2016, 47 Meters Down was given a theatrical release last summer, which proved to be an unlikely success. Mandy Moore (This Is Us) and Claire Holt (The Vampire Diaries) star in the underwater thriller as sisters whose shark diving expedition goes wrong. Trapped on the ocean floor, the girls' air supplies are quickly depleting while a swam of great white sharks circles the area. There are a few unfortunate jump scares, and suspension of disbelief is certainly required, but director Johannes Roberts (The Other Side of the Door) takes a mostly grounded, serious approach, crafting a bit of old-fashioned suspense at a brisk pace. Read my full review of the film here.

5. Mute

Mute is a sci-fi mystery, not a horror movie - although it does have a brutal kill at its climax. Aesthetically, the film is total Blade Runner worship - perhaps even more so than Blade Runner 2049 - so it is gorgeous to look at. Set in the near future, the plot finds a mute bartender (Alexander Skarsgård, True Blood) searching the seedy underbelly of Berlin for his missing girlfriend. But it's the B-story - in which Paul Rudd (Ant-Man) and Justin Theroux (The Girl on the Train) play a pair of wise-cracking black market surgeons - that steals the show. Director Duncan Jones (Moon, Source Code), who co-wrote the script with Michael Robert Johnson (Sherlock Holmes), also throws in a fun nod to Moon that sets Mute in the same universe.

6. Nails

Nails occasionally feels like a lesser Insidious movie (particularly Chapter 3, since both involve injured female antagonists), but it'll hit that sweet spot when you're browsing Netflix for something short (only 85 minutes!) and creepy in the middle of the night. After a nasty hit and run, Dana (Shauna Macdonald, The Descent) is left confined to a hospital bed, barely able to speak or move. She believes someone is in the room with her at night; at first, she feels a presence watching her, and then it starts touching. Her family and doctors dismiss her claims as hallucinations from painkillers. It suffers from a bit too much exposition, but there are some strong horror set pieces. The Irish film earns bonus points for being almost entirely contained to the hospital bed without getting stale.

7. Ravenous

Ravenous (also known as Les Affamés) is yet another post-apocalyptic zombie thriller in the vein of The Walking Dead, but it's better than many of its contemporaries. The Canadian production is in French, but it addresses universal themes in its exploration of human drama. In the film, various rogue survivors band together to strengthen their chances of survival among the hordes of infected. Along the way, it introduces a mysterious ritual of sorts that the zombies perform, though it's never fully paid off. Nevertheless, this one is worth a watch if you’re a fan of recent zombie dramas like Maggie, The Cured, Here Alone, and What We Become.

8. Bad Match

The first act of Bad Match resembles a sophomoric “bro” comedy, but it's worth sitting through to watch it blossom into its final form: Fatal Attraction for the digital age. Jack Cutmore-Scott (Deception) stars as Harris, a 20-something tech worker with a tendency to hook up with women from a Tinder-like dating app and then never speak to them again. He finally meets a woman he really likes, Riley (Lili Simmons, Bone Tomahawk), only to have her become deeply obsessed with him. The supporting cast includes Noureen DeWulf (Anger Management), Chase Williamson (Beyond the Gates), Brandon Scott (Channel Zero), and Trent Haaga (Citizen Toxie: The Toxic Avenger IV).

9. Godzilla: Planet of the Monsters

I'm surprised it has taken this long for Toho to make a Godzilla anime, as both are staples of Japan, and the medium eliminates any limitations caused by having an actor in the rubber suit. Godzilla: Planet of the Monsters is the first installment in a planned anime trilogy. Like many Godzilla films, it spends a tedious amount of time with character exposition before the creatures are introduced. The film is set in 2048, after giant monster attacks have caused the earth to collapse. Humans search space for an inhabitable planet before returning to earth; nearly halfway through the movie, they finally land and start fighting the kaiju. It's an impressive sight when Godzilla finally shows up, as it’s the biggest version of the king of the monsters ever put on screen. With all of the set up out of the way, Planet of the Monsters sets the stage for the next two installments to be even better.

Bonus: The End of the F***ing World

The End of the F***ing World is a British series released in the US as a Netflix original. 17-year-old James (Alex Lawther, Black Mirror) is fairly certain he's a serial killer, but when his would-be first victim, the moody Alyssa (Jessica Barden, The Lobster), invites him to runaway with him, the unstable couple fall for one another. Like Natural Born Killers meets Moonrise Kingdom, their time on the road includes absurd crime, unlikely death, young love, and pitch-black humor. With an engaging story spread out across eight 20-minute episodes, it's virtually impossible not to binge through the entire season in one sitting.

Bonus: Haunters: The Art of the Scare

Haunters: The Art of the Scare is ostensibly a documentary about homemade haunted houses, similar to The American Scream. It profiles a few mom-and-pop haunts, illustrating the communal aspect as well as the strain it can have on personal relationships. But the bulk of the film is dedicated to McKamey Manor, a nonprofit "extreme haunt" run out of certifiably insane guy's house in San Diego. There's a waiting list of thousands of people who are more than willing to be debased on camera for all the internet to see. Deplorable as it may be, it's a fascinating subject that, frankly, should have been the sole subject of the documentary.

[thisguyatthemovies]

You say you want an evolution?

If predatory aliens really are headed to Earth to further evolve by highjacking our DNA, can they hurry up and do it before there’s another “Predator” movie?

“The Predator” – the fourth in a series that started 31 years ago; the sixth if you include the two “Alien/Predator” mashups – hit theaters recently, and many people will see it, regardless of a plethora of negative reviews. Including this one.

Shane Black, who had a role alongside Arnold Schwarzenegger in the original “Predator” (almost universally regarded as the best film in the series), directed and co-wrote this time. And though he knows his way around these types of movies (he wrote the “Lethal Weapon” scripts and wrote and directed “Iron Man 3”), what he has given ardent followers of the franchise is a mess. But not even an interesting mess. Just your garden variety mess.

Take the plot. Please. “The Predator” mixes several story lines, none of them particularly appealing.

There’s Quinn McKenna (Boyd Holbrook), a sniper for the military who has “first contact” with a predator, disables it and then thinks it a good idea to take some of its armor and mail it back home. This brings us to plot point No. 2, McKenna’s autistic 11-year-old son Rory (Jacob Tremblay), who opens the package and starts using the equipment like a virtual reality video game, thus summoning more predators to Earth and making him their target (the implication that those on the autism spectrum are the most advanced form of humans). Also in the mix, a scientist (Olivia Munn) brought in to study the genetics of the captured predator before things, of course, go horribly awry and she, like everyone else, is left to shoot anything and everything.

Throw in a ragtag team of disturbed former soldiers, a government agent who is at first trying to make sure Quinn McKenna is killed but then enlists his help, and a late-in-the-mix story about how “good” predators are trying to reach Earth to save everyone from the “bad” predators, and you get a sense for how much is going on in this movie. And yet there is so much going on that seemingly little happens.

Except … dialogue. The characters talk. All. Of. The. Time. A few lines here and there are about scientific mumbo jumbo, and we get brief snippets (but nothing more) of each of the (too) many characters’ back stories. But mostly it’s profanity and rapid-fire quips that miss the target more than they hit it.

The result is sigh- and groan-inducing. The most talkative scenes are exhausting to watch and listen to. Because there are so many characters to get to, a scene in a bus (Quinn McKenna is being transported to a place where he and the other PTSD-ravaged former soldiers will be killed by the government) seems to go on for weeks. It’s laced with off-color jokes straight out of a high school locker room. And the group includes a former soldier with Tourette’s (are you already laughing?), which at least gives him an excuse for making f**k or a variation thereof every other word to come out of his mouth. The other characters just say it a lot so that, you know, we get it that they’re tough guys.

The bus scene also introduces us to a former soldier played by the always funny Keegan-Michael Key. Only he’s not funny here. You must work to make Key not funny, but the makers of “The Predator” apparently put in the work.

Even during the unnecessarily relentless dialogue, the action never stops. Black kicks things into high gear from the get-go and never lets us catch our breath. Trouble is, most of the action takes place at night, and that, coupled with the frenetic pace, creates a kind of visual white noise effect. Following along can be difficult.

Making matters worse, almost everything is in CGI, and it’s not particularly good CGI by today’s standards. This despite seemingly everyone under the sun having worked on this movie’s graphics. Chances are you know someone on the CGI team. (The credits even include a note on how many jobs were created in the making of “The Predator,” which seems a way to say, “Please don’t criticize this movie.”)

The acting? Not notable, even by action movie standards, which isn’t exactly a high bar to clear. Holbrook is good at playing the nasty “dude bro” (much like he did in “Logan,” only here he is the good guy). Trevante Rhodes (“Moonlight”) has a nice turn as one of the crazy soldiers, having put a bullet hole in his own head, only to walk himself to the hospital. Tremblay seems in over his head, but he’s just a kid.

While Oscar certainly won’t be calling anytime soon, Munn and her character fare the best, though her role seems to diminish as the movie sprints along. She more than holds her own with Quinn McKenna and his band of solider misfits, not only in the killing department but with their nasty dialogue.

Munn made news before “The Predator” opened, rightly calling out Black for having included in the cast a friend who is a registered sex offender. Black at first said he was trying to help actor Steven Wilder Striegel; once the inevitable Twitter firestorm kicked in, he backtracked (doesn’t everyone?) and said the friend in question had lied to him about what his conviction was all about. Munn was upset that her fellow cast members didn’t rally around her, not at first, with at least one publicly wondering if Munn could have waited until after the film’s debut as to not damage its box-office hopes.

20th Century Fox responded to Munn by deleting the scene that included Striegel. After watching “The Predator,” one can’t help but think it’s unfortunate Striegel wasn’t in every single scene.

[bitchoftruth]

Book recs based on Umineko, sorta

I said I would write this like 2 months ago and here I am. The books vary across genres but they all have similar elements to umineko in one way or the other. Of course Umineko is pretty unique so the elements that made me think of umineko are also pretty different in each. Hopefully you will find at least one of the listed interesting. I won’t go into much detail for each, some of them the umineko connection is obvious, in some it’s more of a spoiler. If you need content warnings for any of them feel free to DM me. 

Dark Places by Gillian Flynn (Mystery/Thriller) This is the story of a woman who lost most of her family to a brutal murder for which the other survivor, her brother is in prison for. Years later she agrees to help out some enthusiasts about the case who believe in his brothers innocence to revisit the case despite being sure of her brothers guilt. If the comparison to Ange isn’t obvious yet: she’s also a depressed redhead with a bad attitude. 

We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson (Gothic Horror) People avoid the Blackwood family and the three remaining members like it just fine that way. The only time any of them leaves it is when Mary Katherine buys the weekly groceries and gets books from the library. Don’t read any synopsises of this book if you can help it they give far too much away for such a short book. All you need to know is that  an old paperback copy of this book famously states that what you’re holding is not a book but an item of black magic. 

A Head Full of Ghosts by Paul Tremblay (Thriller/family drama) Believing that their daughter is possessed by a demon the Barret family agrees to a reality tv show deal that will document the exorcism, thinking it is the only way he can afford to help his daughter. Fifteen years later the younger sister revisits the filming location, and her childhood home for an interview and reveals what really happened to the Barret family.

The Basic Eight by Daniel Handler (young adult/mystery) Flannery Culp, your narrator is a murderer. In fact she’s writing the book from prison. Or rather, the book is her journal, she is revising it for publication from prison. She’s a self admittedly unreliable narrator, narrating the things that led up to her committing murder in the first place. There is a lot of rich kid drama involved. 

(If the name of the author sounds familiar, he wrote the Series of Unfortunate Events under the pen name Lemony Snicket. )

The Prestige by Christopher Priest (Historical Fiction) Two magicians who have very opposing ideas on their craft sabotage each other in every turn. It all starts with a botched seance-trick but their rivalry affects both their families for generations. Yes it has a movie adaption though there are major plot differences. I like both versions. 

The Drowning Girlby Caitlín R. Kiernan (Horror-ish) The main character is  schizophrenic* doesn’t beleive she can trust her own memories who are not only impossible but also seem to contradict each other. She writes her memories of the events and figure out if she really had encounters with supernatural beings or if there is another explanation altogether. 

*if you have concerns about the portrayal the author has personal experience with it, same for the transgender and not-straight themes in it

[bloodybver]

Before I Wake (Or Kids Have The Darndest Nightmares)

This one is listed as a horror/drama/thriller on Netflix. A married couple, Jessie (Kate Bosworth) and Mark (Thomas Jane) lose their only son in an unfortunate bathtub drowning accident. Eventually they decide that the best way to get over their grief is to foster a child, Cody (Jacob Tremblay). Cody is pretty damn adorable, but has had some major issues with previous foster parents (one couple straight up disappeared and one guy tried to shoot the kid after his wife went missing. Also his mom was “eaten by the canker man” as Cody tells Jessie). Cody has a hidden stash of caffeine pills (and no one thinks to ask him where he got them. I mean, the kid is like 8 so he can’t just go out and buy them), which Jessie finds under a book about butterflies and promptly takes away, much to his dismay. He doesn’t want to sleep because bad things happen when he does. So Jessie and Mark are chillin downstairs after they finally convince Cody to sleep and suddenly there are butterflies everywhere. Cody wakes up shortly after they appear and they disintegrate. Uh oh, the kid seems to have the ability to manifest his dreams. The next night it’s butterfly time again with the added bonus of THEIR DEAD SON...who disappears along with the butterflies when Cody snaps awake again. After a few more nights like this, things start to get dark. And creepy. Plot plot plot, spoiler spoiler spoiler...

There is a 15-20 minute period towards the end of movie that is pretty fucking creepy, and there are very few jump scares which is always a plus to me (because they always feel like a cheap shot). However, there is a scene that’s pretty much a ripoff of the clown scene in Poltergeist, so you know what’s coming. The acting is pretty good (again, Jacob Tremblay is really likable as the kid), and the cinematography is very atmospheric. Some of the CGI doesn’t work (there’s a scene in particular with “the canker man” that just looks cheap), and the ending is both too neat and not neat enough. If you can’t find anything else to watch, I’d give it a go.

Overall Score: 3 glowing butterflies out of 5

[johnnymundano]

Shut In (2016)

Directed by Farren Blackburn

Screenplay by Christina Hodson

Music by Nathaniel Méchaly

Country: France, Canada

Running time: 91 minutes

CAST

Naomi Watts as Mary Portman

Oliver Platt as Dr. Bennett Wilson

Charlie Heaton as Stephen Portman

David Cubitt as Doug Hart

Jacob Tremblay as Tom Patterson

Clémentine Poidatz as Lucy

Crystal Balint as Grace Mitchell

Alex Braunstein as Aaron Hart

Peter Outerbridge as Richard Portman

Shut In is the kind of glossy, well-acted mainstream thriller I sometimes feel polite society would rather I waste my eyes on, rather than ancient, less than salubrious Italian chillers no one normal cares about. Of course when I do watch a glossy, well-acted mainstream thriller like Shut In I often find they are crap, and thus feel a lot better about watching a paraplegic Donald Pleasance solving crimes with a straight razor wielding chimp. Or whatever the hell was going on in Phenomena (1985). Fun Fact: When I first typed the title of this post it came out of my fingers as Shit In. Subconscious much?

If it was my cheeky little subconscious at work it would be quite apt as that’s what they call “psychology” and Shut In concerns Mary (Naomi Watts), a female child psychologist. Mary works from her isolated home since she also has to care for her step-son Stephen (Charlie Heaton), who is in a vegetative state following a car accident in which his father died. That’s a hard row to hoe, so Mary is herself receiving counselling from Dr. Wilson (Oliver Platt). Things may be starting to look up for poor Mary, as she is contemplatively flicking through care home brochures for Stephen while cautiously reciprocating amorous advances from burly Doug (David Cubitt). When Tom (Jacob Tremblay), a patient Mary has become attached to, goes missing Sarah begins hearing strange noises and dreaming strange dreams. As the days pass Mary starts to fear she is losing her mind, and as a snow storm closes the stage is set for a confrontation as predictable as it is silly.

If you want to enjoy the terribleness of Shut In for yourself you should stop reading there (or here, I guess) as I am going to SPOIL it by talking about how awful it is. Unfortunately it is impossible to get across quite how offensively dumb Shut In is without SPOILING it. Or at least, I’m not going to bother finding a way because, hey, life’s too short. And, let’s face it Shut In SPOILS itself by being awful. The set-up is good but, c’mon, who can’t see what’s coming?  In the interests of fairness I tried to hide it in the synopsis, but if you watch the movie it’s as predictable as the fact this sentence will end with a full stop. The whole movie is a kind of exercise in flop sweated desperation as it frogmarches its plot into the ridiculous convolutions required to make this insipid bullshittery “work”. And for all its huffing and puffing Shut in still doesn’t work. It’s not even that you can see what’s coming, a Gay Pride float in a Gay Pride Parade has more subtlety, it’s that it all makes no sense whatsoever. In comparison Body Double (1984) looks like a documentary. Shut In doesn’t just require you to suspend your disbelief, it requires you to hang it by the neck until dead.

Shut In is set in a world of idiots, where someone can be diagnosed as being in a vegetative state following a car smash, with the only check being that they haven’t moved much since they were admitted. Apparently nobody has done any tests on Stephen during the 6 months since the crash other than looking at him and deciding he hasn’t moved. Cunningly though, Stephen only moves when nobody is around. He just, you know, “knows” when nobody is around, and so has never been caught once in 6 months. He must be the only teenager in existence who has never been surprised by his parent when doing something he shouldn’t be doing. During those 6 months Mary has been taking care of Stephen’s every need; feeding, bathing and whatevering him. At no point during the 6 months of Mary pushing baby food into his mouth or sponging his Gentleman Jim in the bath has he once broken cover. As Stephen Charlie Heaton (from TV’s ‘80s nostalgia bath and merchandise generator Stranger Things) is okay, but he plays an impossible character. “Evil man-child with preternatural levels of self-control” would task anyone to imbue it with believability. He tries, bless him but ends up as just a common or garden movie nutter.  

Naomi Watts is fantastic, but Naomi Watts is always fantastic. Unfortunately for Naomi Watts being fantastic isn’t enough here. She’s like a solid core of believability around which a load of noisy, ridiculous bullshit revolves, constantly reminding you that Naomi Watts should be doing something better with her time. Maybe she took the role as some kind of audition tape, she does get to do a whole load of acting after all; doting mother, crazy lady, fierce protector and drug addled goofball. Because for Shut In’s plot to work (it doesn’t) Stephen has to slip her his pills which cause her to get way spacy. Okay,  I’m not a medical professional so maybe they do medicate shut-ins with the kind of drugs Stephen uses to put a crimp in Mary’s reality. Sure, it’s possible that shut-ins are basically doped up and tripping balls all the time in there, but I doubt it. if any medical professionals would like to take the time out of their busy schedule to defend the use of medication in Shut In, you know where to find me. Oh, and poor old lovable Oliver Platt plays a psychiatrist who provides face-time therapy before the script forces him to emulate the Scatman Crothers role in Kubrick’s The Shining (1980). At times, in fact, you can almost hear Shut In grunt with the effort to emulate The Shining, but all it does is make you want to watch The Shining rather than Shut In.

What’s worse is how nasty the (barely sub-) subtext of Shut  In is; it seems, intentionally or not, to be that as soon as they reach adolescence you should maybe give some serious thought to killing your kids before they kill you. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a movie as fearful of children growing up. And I’ve seen Christine (1983) more than once. And, yeah, Stephen is Mary’s step-son not her birth son, but that’s obviously just pathetic cowardice on the scriptwriter’s part. It all gets a bit Oedipal in there towards the end, which would be supremely creepy if he was her natural son, and Shut In just isn’t that low class, thanks. It would have been better if Shut In had grasped the nettle and gone low, because supremely creepy is at least interesting. And the movie ends up being supremely creepy accidentally anyway, with its emphasis on kids being monsters once they won’t let you chuch their chubby cheeks anymore. The “feel good” ending is truly horrible. Mary ends up adopting the tiny, cute moppet Tom after killing her own son, Stephen. A smarter movie would have gone in hard on this nastiness and left you uncertain about whether she’ll be violently trading in Tom too once his balls drop. Basically, Shut In needed to be a lot nastier and far smarter, it needed someone like Brian de Palma to work. But there is no one else like Brian De Palma, and so Shut In doesn’t have Brian De Palma, and so it doesn’t work.

Seriously, Shut In is so bad it’s baffling. It looks like the kind of movie mums and dads like, it’s got a great cast, it’s civilly filmed and there’s an onus on suspense rather than gore. I’m not averse to that myself on occasion, but then I am a dad. But, Christ, the plot to this thing is so ridiculous it should star George Hilton and Edwige Fenech and come in a banana yellow blu-ray case, with a commentary track by Troy Howarth consisting of him just laughing for 91 minutes.